Government rejects Joe Biden’s declarations

Venezuela’s Vice-president Jorge Arreaza read an official communique rejecting declarations made by the Vice-President of the United Sates, Joe Biden. “[Maduro] has tried to distract the attention of his people from the most important issues at play in Venezuela by inventing extravagant conspiracies about the United States that are totally false,” said Biden to the Chilean newspaper El Mercurio. (Biden’s interview is translated into Spanish in the original).

The communique read by Arreaza reaffirms some of the conspiracy accusations made by the Venezuelan government. Here are some excerpts from the text:

The President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro Moros, in the name of the people and the Venezuelan Government, categorically rejects the declarations made by the Vice-president of the United States, Joe Biden, because they constitute disrespect to Venezuela’s sovereignty, and a direct act of aggression against the people who has suffered the attacks of a fascist sector that has advanced a strategy of on-going coup d’état.

These violent sector, promoted by the most radical wing of the Venezuelan right, are open executors of destabilizing calls, and receive funding from offices of the United States government with the purpose of threatening the tranquility of the Venezuelan people, and thus hurting a solid democracy that has received popular support in 18 elections during the last 15 years.

The Government of the United States has linked itself to an international media conspiracy that aims at generating a false image of war and repression within the Venezuelan territory. The truth is that [violence] has been limited to specific points created by the authors of violence against the people.

(…)

The Government of the United States, the main promoter of world violence, expert in invasions, economic blockades, wars initiated by economic interests under the pretexts of fictitious threads, creator of lethal weapons of mass destruction, and responsible for the death of thousands of millions of civilians around the world, has no moral standing to object to the respect of human rights in Venezuela and the efforts of the Venezuelan Government to preserve the peace of our country.

However, the Venezuelan Government reiterates its clear will to restart and renew relations with the Government of the United States of America, through direct and transparent dialogue, under the basis of mutual respect, the non-interference in internal affairs, and necessary cooperation. Therefore, [the Venezuelan Government] has decided to designate a new ambassador to that country [United States].

The Government and the people of Bolívar, the people of Chávez, with its history of heroic deeds, will always fight to keep its impendence.

Venezuela is to be respected!

Long live Chávez! The Fatherland will live on! [¡Chávez vive, la patria sigue! ]

Caracas, March 9, 2014.